POLITICAL SCIENCE.
Enough has been said to show that a system of represen-
tation in a-considerable territory is a preservative
Representation in . . .
democracies. against some of the evils to which city-states are
liable. And for the same reason that large territories under
flemocratic rule are more moderate and conservative than lit-
tle republics, it is evident that the free landholders in a large
democratic state are less innovating, less inclined to sudden
excitements than the people of large cities. Representation,
however, has evils of its own, which we will presently con-
sider. At present we ask, what were some of the evidences
of extreme democracy in the ancient city-states, and whether
they can appear in the modern system ? Since the essential
notion in democracy is that all, rich and poor, have equal po-
litical as well as civil rights, and the rich form the minority,
the government must be in the hands of the lower classes, if
they can be made to combine together. (Comp. Aristot,, Pol.,
vi. or iv., 4, § 2.) This can be effected by the modern dema-
gogue as well as by the ancient one, for the press and the
public gathering take the place in some degree of the city
assembly. It is not easy, however, in modern times, outside
of large towns, to make the poor believe that the rich are their
enemies, nor do we find the strifes and suspicions of classes
to prevail in modern times in democracies more than in other
forms of government. It is the condition of a country as it
respects wages, population, and the means of rising in the
world, and as it respects the sway of moral motives looking
towards industry and sobriety, rather than its form of govern-
ment, that produces restlessness and the spirit of revolution
in the more ignorant classes, or the opposite temper. Nearly
all of this spirit which has shown itself in the United States
proceeded first from foreign workmen, and is fomented by
persons of this class. And so far as this spirit is supported
by communistic and socialistic principles, it is far from being
democratic, for it is -the spirit which brings the individual
under the yoke of others, instead of giving him the largest
liberty.
The extreme democratic spirit, like the despotic, is the